It’s stopped raining!

5.3.16

Happy birthday to my gorgeous nephew Henry, 17 today.

Its not raining !!!!!!!
This is the first morning we’ve not woken to the sound of buckets of rain.The Hashers have got back to us, they’re going to pick us up between 2.30 pm and 2.45 pm.
So we’re going to go to Satok Market for a quick look round this morning.

We walked to the bus area and saw a yellow roofed minibus and asked if they were going to Satok
Its funny how after a few weeks travelling you lose that British mentality of being scared to ask.
They said they could take us for 1RM each, bargain!

The market is huge, amazingly colourful, mainly food with a few plants, bags, t shirts etc.
Most stall holders are from the Iban community who travel to Kuching and stay there all weekend selling their produce.

I bought a new bag, typical Sarawak design

We had lunch in the large food court there, chicken satay, rice and fried noodles.

We crossed the huge main road and waited for a bus. A few minutes later an elderly man in a minibus stopped and asked if we wanted a lift into town for 2RM each.
Perfect.

Got back to our room and got changed to go hashing. We had another message saying to take a change of clothes and a towel. Its all a bit scary unknown, are they all super fit and will I be the only one walking, what will the meal after be like, will anyone speak English?

Lena picked us up, with Nancy who never stopped giggling. She’s been a hasher for over 30 years.
They had been worrying how they would communicate with us thinking we were Turkish.
Nancy is Malay, Lena is Chinese and both speak perfect English.
The start point was over an hour and a half away near the Indonesian Borneo border, in a village called Tringgus.

I’ve never seen so many 4×4 vehicles, it must be a hash requirement here!

So many people, no one had brollies or rain macs so I left mine in the car.
There was no circling or discussion before starting, next we knew we were off!
First challenge, a bamboo pole bridge

Next was a fast moving river, holding on for grim death with my phone stuffed in my bra, the water was hip deep, and I just prayed I didn’t slip and lose my phone forever.
Next was a 90 degree mud slope. I was desperately clinging onto any strong looking branches to pull myself up.
As I looked around at all the Asian faces I felt like I’d somehow found myself in some sort of Japanese extreme survival show.
It looked like it must be the top, the views were lovely.

But no, I was told it was half half, and sure enough round the bend was more muddy steepness!
This changed to a lovely flat clearing, where I spotted one random pineapple plant, beautiful.

Then it was time to go down, thankfully not the same way we came up but very slippy.
It was a massive relief to be down the bottom, even though we had bamboo poles to walk over and a couple more bridges, but thankfully not as long.
I felt really pathetic walking slowly sideways over the poles, whilst they just strolled over normally.
Luckily they were all so friendly and supportive..

We then walked through the village, I just love these traditional little places

Then back to the start for post walk treats. The curry puffs were delicious.

And of course the ‘down downs’,

Next was some raucous songs on their very own trucks microphones and some sitting on ice…we had to do it too as new Hashers but I chose not to bare my bum.

The truck also has a shower, some people used that, some lathered up with soap in the back of their trucks or by their cars with huge water bottles.

Some bathed in the river

I was a little anxious as to where John was, he went off with the runners, some of whom were back. Numerous jokes that he’d been eaten by a crocodile or a tiger, then he appeared, very muddy and had slipped and hurt his arm, but being very brave.
He had a well earned bath in the river

Then it was off to a restaurant, on the outskirts of Kuching. The restaurant belongs to one of the Hashers and the beer is sponsored and free!
They have their meal their after each hash, and there’s karaoke too.

We had been discussing unusual Asian food with Lena & Nancy on the journey there and were saying how we could never eat things like chicken feet.
So imagine the hilarity when they served chicken feet soup.
John ate his, I had one little bit and ate all the juice which was delicious, but I couldn’t bring myself to eat the bits that look like feet!

We also had chicken in a lovely batter and sauce, rice, pork belly and fried whitebait.
After 3 beers John decided he was going to join in karaoke, and sang Delilah.

We were called up with another newbie, from the USA, to introduce ourselves.

Then there was even a huge birthday cake for the birthday people and a rousing happy birthday song. I felt very honoured to be included.

These people have to be some of the nicest, funniest, and kindest we’ve ever met.
They made us so welcome and we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.
John seemed to be really enjoying the beer and made lots of new friends.

Lena drove us home, she was telling us about her job, her husband and her son.
They are stockbrokers and their son is going to uni soon.
She found it strange that our children don’t live in the same country as us and explained how in her Hokkien Chinese culture when her son marries the daughter in law will move in with them, but in Malay Muslim tradition the son goes to  live with the brides family.

Felt very sad when it was time to say goodbye, we’re so glad we persisted in trying to get hold of the group.
We’ve been invited to their big party in Bali next year, but its a little too far!

When we got back John was violently sick and crashed out immediately.

We are supposed to be going to Bako tomorrow, been waiting for good weather all week and now its the last opportunity.
Let’s see how he is in the morning…..

I’m off to do my nursing duties…